Transaction Analysis

Seattle Royale

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By signing Hernandez to the richest pitcher contract in history, the Mariners are taking on a staggering amount of risk. By signing Hernandez to this deal two seasons prior to his date with free agency, the Mariners are opening themselves up to relentless second-guessing. And by signing Hernandez to this deal the Mariners took the only real way out—that seems to be one of the big defenses, at least.

Hernandez means a ton to the Mariners fan base—perhaps more than any other team's most-talented player. If you know the Hernandez mythology then you know Hernandez snubbed the Yankees and additional dollars for the Mariners as an amateur. (He's since snubbed free agency twice now in order to remain in Seattle.) In return the Mariners faithful have done what people living in dire conditions throughout history have done: anoint the most powerful amongst them king and then celebrate his presence every fifth day with costumes and songs. Giving Hernandez this deal isn't just about keeping him happy, but about keeping his fans—his people—happy, too. A royal life, indeed.

Uncertainty is the other main defense point about the timing of the new deal. Picture this scenario: Hernandez compiles back-to-back Cy Young consideration-worthy campaigns in 2013 and 2014, and then hits the open market. What dollar value would he receive then? We don't know and we'll never know, unless the Mariners reveal Felix2 at some point in the future. We can get a decent idea if Justin Verlander and Clayton Kershaw take their stabs on the free-agent market. But otherwise this is all guesswork.

While those are understandable defenses, there are points on the other end of the spectrum worthy of consideration. The big one is that durable pitchers also break. Credit the universe's sense of timing for seeing Hernandez sign a blockbuster deal during the same week Brandon Webb retires and Chris Carpenter's playing career is put on halt. The Webb news in particular is concerning. He was, much like Hernandez, a top-three talent with a roaring streak of 200-plus inning seasons. He threw four innings in 2009 and never pitched in the majors again.

Okay, so Hernandez's career is unlikely to follow the same path. History does tell us, however, that Hernandez is unlikely to continue tossing 230 or more innings per season. Since 1990 only five other pitchers have pulled the feat in four straight seasons. Only three did it in five. None did it in six. Lower the innings threshold to 200 and 18 pitches have strung together six straight seasons of 200 innings. Maybe Hernandez will join both fraternities in due time; maybe he's Greg Maddux. But what if he's not?

Here is what both sides can agree on: Hernandez remains remarkably young; he'll turn 34 the season after this contract expires. He's been a workhorse, and he deserves all the superlatives he receives. If you had to pick a pitcher to make a lengthy commitment to then Hernandez is on your short list. Likewise, Hernandez is on your short list for the Cy Young award. Here's one more point everyone should agree on: The Mariners are taking a huge risk with this deal. They're betting on Hernandez the person, on his body, and against bad luck. Trading Hernandez, or allowing him to leave via free agency, probably never felt like feasible options to the Mariners; this extension working out might not feel like a feasible option either, depending on your perspective.

One item that should also be considered, as this isn't a free agency deal: it's also partially a reward for services rendered. For his career to date, Felix has been very underpaid. I'm certain that aspect was part of the negotiations, and Seattle's management would be hard pressed to argue against that point.

Another aspect to consider is the "keeping his fans" happy part. I'm guessing Seattle's marketing group was able to demonstrate pretty easily that tying up Hernandez for the foreseeable future would help with a variety of merchandising for the next several years. This is not just about looking at dollars per win for this specific player. I could imagine that a prolonged contract discussion in 2013 and 2014 would eat into Hernandez jersey sales, for example. And I can't imagine the Smoak jerseys are flying off the shelves.

In other words, while Seattle is taking on considerable risk, and this contract in 2019 could be an albatross, I think it's unlikely that Felix Hernandez's P&L for the rest of his career will end up red.

An insurance policy has to be factored into assessing the M's risk. I have to assume the team cannot eliminate all of its financial risk, but there must be significant mitigation through insurance against a Webb-like ending.

I remember reading an article last year when Strasburg's inning limit was making news that his manager said it wasn't about pitch counts, but about how many times his arm warmed up and cooled down between innings.

This same franchise was risk adverse when facing Randy Johnson's impending free agency and sold nine years too early, leaving the franchise's best pitcher to enter the Hall of Fame as a Diamondback. This M's fan is glad to see them not repeating that mistake again. Risk aversion is sensible but we're talking about a pitcher who will be not much older than CC Sabathia is now when his contract expires. All kinds of things are possible but this is a calculated risk worth taking.

Um, you just said you're glad they're not repeating the same mistake. You said they let Johnson go nine years too early. I was highly disagreeing with your point that Johnson and Felix's situation were the same.

Good for you. Go ahead and highly disagree. I'm glad they extended Felix and I contend this fan base needed this. It all comes back to tickets and TV deals eventually.

Felix and Randy were in very different situations, but because of Randy this fan base needed this Felix deal. It's ultimately a business, with or without the demographic differences between the two players.

Yes, there's been plenty of suffering to go around. Your list is silly though. Buhner retired a Mariner. Kaz never played for another MLB team. Why are you even bringing them up? Do you actually know anything about the Mariners or are you just good with Wikipedia? Why not put Dan Wilson on the list while you're at it? He played for the M's for a long time and was super popular. Hell, Jose Paniagua was good for one or two seasons too.

It's reasonable to suggest that the Mariner fan base has been traumatized by the mishandled/snakebit/inevitable departures of Randy/Griffey/ARod (though the bullet dodged on the latter becomes clearer each season). I'm glad we won't be seeing our current franchise player winning the World Series for someone else. Now if the team can use the Felix window to actually do something relevant in the coming years.

I bring them up because they were fan favorites and losing them did hurt the fan base. Only having two winning seasons in the last nine years (2004-2012) hasn't helped.

I thought about Dan Wilson, but I'm pretty sure if I had added him, you would've laughed at that. Heck I'm pretty sure there are a few Gil Meche or Carlos Guillen fans but I didn't include them either.

And yes, I know a bit about the Mariners. I used to live in Oregon which gets Seattle broadcasts, been to Safeco a few times (and even attended a get-together there with Jonah Keri, Rob Neyer, Derek Zumsteg and a few others) and read the USS Mariner. I wouldn't call myself a Mariners expert, especially since I moved to Denver in 2008, but they're in the Top 10 of teams I'm familiar with.

And btw, there's always the chance that Felix gets traded so he may end up winning a World Series for someone else.

But, again, to sum up:
1. Randy's situation wasn't the same as Felix's
2. There've been more important and more recent things than have affected the Mariners' fan base since Randy's departure fifteen years ago.
3. As a Mariners' fan, you should know #1 and #2. If not, I suggest you use baseball-reference instead of Wikipedia.

And you're still hung up on something that happened 15 years ago. Heck I'm a Cubs fan and realize that the Cubs current situation isn't directly related to Greg Maddux being let go before his Cy Young situation.

All in all, you lack understanding and seem to want to pick a fight. So, I'll prefer to be a fungus and stop talking to you on this thread.

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Fungus,

I'm glad I didn't need to take medication for you to go away.

The Randy compare/contrast continues with the latest news about the elbow. Hoping the M's carve out some protection in this contract--rather than letter the whole malady (in Randy's case, worries over his back) jeopardize the relationship.

I just don't see the risk. They got him through his prime, and they're not getting the later portion of his decline. He's not a man with a gimmick pitch and with the way the market works now, a bad deal doesn't look so bad 2 years down the road because the baseline gets bumped up a ridiculous amount every year. The Mariners never have been able to bid on large free agents and with the cap on the draft now, the money was just burning a hole in their pocket. It's not like the Cardinals with Pujols & Holliday when, at the time Holliday was signed, they had to choose between one or the other.

Hold up. A rebuilding franchise far behind 3 divisional competitors pours 2 team payroll's worth of money into one player after he logged 950 innings over four season's and experienced velocity issues the year prior and you don't see the element of risk? A case can be made that its a good deal for Seattle but come on, it's clearly risky. Personally, I think they bid against themselves two year's prior to it being necessary. King doesn't have to decline much for this contract to become problematic. The history of long term expensive pitching contracts isn't exactly a thumb on the scale favoring the deal.

As a lifelong Mariner's fan and PNW resident, and also a sabermetric geek who's watch Felix ascent since A ball, I can say no single player means more to their team than Felix Hernandez. After Arod,Randy Johnson, even Ken Griifey all left after starting their careers here(hedging Johnson's Montreal time), Felix is finally a standout figure willing to deal with our rainy Winters and wear the knight's armor in the name of building a competitor.

He loves the area and the fans and we love him, maybe as much as we loved Griffey. All hail the King, loyalty is royalty indeed!